Canada's Naval History

The Second World War
The Merchant Navy - The Merchant Navy

Between 1939 and 1945, Canadian and Allied merchant ships and their crews transported personnel, munitions, weapons, and food across the world's oceans as part of the Allied war effort. Enemy action sank some 70 Canadian and Newfoundland merchant vessels. Over 1,600 Canadians and Newfoundlanders, including eight women, were killed.

SS Lake Pennask

In this early postwar photograph, the former SS Temagami Park is seen at Aruba with its new name, SS Lake Pennask.

Completed in early 1944 as the Temagami Park, and operated by the Anglo-Canadian Shipping Company, by 1946 the ship, bought by Western Canada Steamships, had been renamed Lake Pennask. After the end of the Second World War, the Canadian government disposed of the Temagami Park and other vessels owned by the Park Steamship Company, largely through sale as surplus. The former Temagami Park would go through two more owners and names before being scrapped in 1970.

George Metcalf Archival Collection
CWM 20010110-008